The Plagiarist Polka

[JohnBoddie]

PFFA has recently seen a series of plagiarized poems posted as “tests” to “prove” that commentary at PFFA is arbitrary and uninformed.

It’s worth remembering that:

Dr. Suess’s original book, To Think that I Saw it on Mulberry Street, was turned down by 27 publishers.

James Joyce’s Dubliners was turned down by 22 publishers.

Emily Dickenson only had seven poems published during her lifetime.

In 1969, the well-known writer Jerzy Kosinski published a novel, Steps, which won the National Book Award. In 1975, a freelance writer named Chuck Ross was convinced that unknown writers just didn't have a chance to have a novel accepted. To test his theory, Ross typed out the first twenty-one pages of Steps and sent them out to four publishers, using the pseudonym "Erik Demos." All four rejected the sample. In 1977, Ross typed out the entire book and, again using the name "Erik Demos," sent it to ten publishers and thirteen literary agents. One of the publishers was Random House, which had originally published Steps in 1969. The manuscript was neither recognized nor accepted by any publishers or literary agents, including Random House, which used a form rejection letter. That made twenty-seven rejections for a book that had won an important literary prize!

All of this proves what?

Actually, it proves nothing more than the well-known fact that not every reader likes works that may be highly thought of by others. The “tests” that show up from time to time from plagiarists show even less as they invariably choose weak or obscure work by recognized authors in the misguided belief that it “proves their point.”

How pathetic.

JB

[River Not]

Originally posted by JohnBoddie PFFA has recently seen a series of plagiarized poems posted as “tests” to “prove” that commentary at PFFA is arbitrary and uninformed. [...]

All of this proves what?

Actually, it proves nothing more than the well-known fact that not every reader likes works that may be highly thought of by others. The “tests” that show up from time to time from plagiarists show even less as they invariably choose weak or obscure work by recognized authors in the misguided belief that it “proves their point.”

How pathetic.

JB


then why did you bother posting this, and what does that say about you, JohnBoddie?

For God's sake, man, if you're going to write a decent discourse, then write a decent discourse. Please.

[rimbaud]

Frankly, I take some heart from John's post. There are alot of newbie posters here, and it is easy to doubt one's poetry, but even easier to doubt one's critiqueing skills. When a newbie says that a work needs help, only to have the plagiarizer turn around on them and say this is a well known work can demolish one's confidence in critting. Therefore I find this discourse useful, though indulging these plagiarizers by worrying about the matter isn't helping much either.

My 3 cents,
Paul

[TanyaLS]

Originally posted by River Not
then why did you bother posting this, and what does that say about you, JohnBoddie?

For God's sake, man, if you're going to write a decent discourse, then write a decent discourse. Please.

With all due respect, I must say that in my opinion, and as far as the expectations of Pffa seem to stand, everyone, man, woman, or teen has a right to rant in this forum as long as that rant is not directed toward crits or how the board is run. That said, I think JB has excercised an important point. That point is simply that no one critic is all-knowing, nor is even a culmination of critics(this has been proven by his concrete examples); neither does this fact give excuse to plagiarism, or the attempt to test the people who participate in this, or any, venue. Why this venue pisses so many people off, I'll never know. If you don't want to know peoples opinions, don't post. If you're not brave enough to write and post your own poetry, please don't post others and take credit if the poem is praised, or lash out when another is trashed. This whole idea is completely beyond my comprehension and is almost as sick a crime as I personally have experienced. Not that anybody's ever plagiarized me(as if), but the more I see it happen, the more I wonder if it's really worth sharing one's poetry anymore. I think Melanie said it best: Shame on you. Plagiarist.

Tanya

[mindsweeper]

When a newbie says that a work needs help, only to have the plagiarizer turn around on them and say this is a well known work can demolish one's confidence in critting.

I'm a newbie critter and I critted one of these plagiarised posts and I stand by every word of my crit. What I'd love to know, however, is the name of the publisher of the poem. I've got a few poems hanging around in a drawer........

Ruth

[Autumn]

Originally posted by JohnBoddie: PFFA has recently seen a series of plagiarized poems posted as “tests” to “prove” that commentary at PFFA is arbitrary and uninformed.

All of this proves what?

To me, it simply proves that PFFAers are honest enough to say that they do not need to like every published work or every poems, published or otherwise of ‘published’ poets. The ‘tests’ just serve to show that PFFAers can still give an honest critique of how they read a poem, published or otherwise.

Besides that, what’s also wonderful is that PFFAers come from many nations worldwide and we get to hear many different opinions and ideas; and everyone is helping each other to improve the craft of writing poetry.

Hurray for PFFA and PFFAers!

Autumn
[size=0.5]Am I in the right forum? Yes, this is ‘claps’[/size]
ranting

[Kim]

Originally posted by River Not
then why did you bother posting this, and what does that say about you, JohnBoddie?

For God's sake, man, if you're going to write a decent discourse, then write a decent discourse. Please.

Oh, that's rich.

[Dunc]

Amen, JB.

If all the stuff that's won awards but that I don't want to read were laid end to end, it would cover most of the US National Debt.

As for poor little buggers who are so upset when their best efforts are kicked out of Merciless that they resort, not just to plagiary, but to public deceit which they think is justified by their own misconceptions about poetry - well, they're poor little buggers.

Regards / Dunc

[River Not]

sure, JB's points were valid, but was it necessary to add, "How pathetic"?

Personally, I thought the opinion expressed by the banned patron in outside was so flawed that it didn't warrant refutation.

If this board, pffa, enables its participants to comment knowledgeably on any poem, whether that poem is the work of a so-called "poet" or not, and if some participants comment on a piece that, unbeknownst to them, perhaps, was written by a "poet", and in those comments rightfully express dissatisfaction with some of the poem's lines or phrases, then that *act* of critical commenting in itself credits pffa with a source for knowledge, not a source for a lack of knowledge.

Familiarity with various poetic works, and the ability to recognize various poetic works, does not in itself account for knowledge [or should I say, Wisdom], in my humble opinion.

These are the thoughts I had in mind when I quickly blew off the whole fiasco conducted by whoever it was that thought he or she was being clever.

I thought to myself, this board's defense is that it does engender critical evaluation amongst its participants, and they practice that ability well.


call me poor, see if I care.

[Nanphi]

The purpose of posting to a workshop is to obtain critique, which may range from simple reader reaction to suggestions about how--in someone's opinion--the poem might be "improved". If Seamus Heaney suddenly upped and posted a poem to High or Merciless, we'd assume that's what he was after and do our best to give it to him. Whether he paid us any attention would be up to him. Almost any poem is at least theoretically improvable. I've never seen anything posted here that was simply praised by awe-struck PFFAers and I doubt I ever will.
This is a free-for-all, no holds barred. Nobody's going to be intimidated by big-name, Nobel-winning poets. Nor is anyone expected to waste time playing spot-that-quote, as if participation here were some sort of test; the moderators and members have better things to do with their time. Nothing is proved by some puerile plagiarist sneaking in a published poem (of whatever quality) except the plagiarist's malice and bad faith.

- Nanphi

[jsdealy]

Nothing is proved ... except the plagiarist's malice and bad faith.And into that Ring he poured his...

As resident PFFA yes-man, I second everyone's opinion (except the plagiarist scum in all his incarnations, naturally).

And just for fun, I thought I'd toss a big fat WHO CARES into the fray.

Somehow I get the impression that the workshop as a whole will be able to scrape through this one, if we band together and work as a team.

I nominate Howard as first to go if we have to resort to cannibalism. Sorry bud. You're the obese (http://www.everypoet.org/pffa/showthread.php?threadid=23092&poems) one around here.

- Justin

[HowardM2]

In anticipation of such an exigency, I have been lounging about all afternoon in a vat of barbeque sauce; I appear to be quite thoroughly marinated.

[Kaltica]

In 1969, the well-known writer Jerzy Kosinski published a novel, Steps, which won the National Book Award. In 1975, a freelance writer named Chuck Ross was convinced that unknown writers just didn't have a chance to have a novel accepted. To test his theory, Ross typed out the first twenty-one pages of Steps and sent them out to four publishers, using the pseudonym "Erik Demos." All four rejected the sample. In 1977, Ross typed out the entire book and, again using the name "Erik Demos," sent it to ten publishers and thirteen literary agents. One of the publishers was Random House, which had originally published Steps in 1969. The manuscript was neither recognized nor accepted by any publishers or literary agents, including Random House, which used a form rejection letter. That made twenty-seven rejections for a book that had won an important literary prize!

All of this proves what?

Actually, it proves nothing more than the well-known fact that not every reader likes works that may be highly thought of by others.
Hmm, I'm not sure that it proves even that, John. Indeed, I would be far more inclined to believe that it proves nothing more than what Chuck Ross meant it to prove: that unknown writers had little chance of having a book published.

The experience with Random House not recognizing "Steps" is particularly telling. My guess is that either Ross's submission was not read at all or, at the very least, was not read by anyone familiar with one of the more successful books that this company had published.

Who knows? Perhaps it is naive of us to believe that these companies employ the thousands of reader-editors that they would require in order to consider each and every unsolicited manuscript from unknown authors? Would it be cynical to suggest that they might hold a submission for a while before rejecting it so as to give the false impression that someone there had actually read it?

Perhaps a better illustration of your point would be any of the hundreds of scathing reviews of published works which currently number among the classics.

[arthur_henry]

<snipped--thought better of snide remark>

[River Not]

Originally posted by arthur_henry
<snipped--thought better of snide remark>


is that what that was meant to be?

funny, I thought you were trying to tell someone they'd inspired you to try some new lingo-style, or something.